Getting schooled by the teacher

Since we’re in back-to-school mode, and I’m fresh off welcoming students back to Jalen Rose Leadership Academy after a year of virtual teaching, I wanted to dedicate an episode of “Renaissance Man” to someone who has inspired me in the education game. A decade ago, I started my charter school in Detroit. Previously, I had been giving scholarship money and started an endowment at the University of Michigan, but about 15 years ago, I saw a segment on CNN about education advocate Dr. Steve Perry, founder of Capital Prep charter schools, and it would end up changing my own charitable focus. He was the founder, the chief fund-raiser and the bus driver. A natural disruptor in the education space, he was like Crazy Joe Clark in “Lean on Me,” with one exception: He didn’t carry a bat.

I was intrigued. At the time, I was working in Bristol, Conn., so I went to his school in Hartford. We hit it off, and he’s become a mentor and a friend. Dr. Perry is self-made, and his origin story is much like that of the inner-city kids he serves.

“I grew up in public housing,” Dr. Perry told me. “I was born on my mother’s 16th birthday. My father was in prison by the time I was 18 . . . I was bad at school. I remember [when] somebody in college called me ‘intellectual.’ I was like, ‘Yo, say it again.’ I thought that they were being disrespectful to me.”

The Connecticut native said he wasn’t a bad kid, but he wasn’t in the best environment. He played sports, but at 5-foot-9 and 145 pounds, he wasn’t going pro. He also had the option of hustling and slinging dope, which included a lot of standing around in the cold, and that didn’t suit him. But, he knew he wasn’t built for the consequences of that life.